(Adds dropped word ‘of’ in paragraph 4)
By Herbert Villarraga and Steve Gorman
TUCSON, Arizona, Feb 15 (Reuters) – Investigators have obtained a DNA sample from a discarded glove that was found near Nancy Guthrie’s Arizona home and appears to match the pair worn by a masked prowler seen in video footage caught by her doorbell camera before she was abducted two weeks ago, the FBI said on Sunday.
The preliminary findings from a private crime laboratory in Florida were received by the FBI on Saturday and were awaiting “quality control and official confirmation” on Sunday before investigators run the results through a national database of known DNA profiles, the FBI said in a statement.
The process typically takes 24 hours from when the Federal Bureau of Investigation receives a DNA sample.
The glove was one of roughly 16 collected by investigators in recent days in a search zone within two miles of the Tucson-area residence of 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie, the mother of U.S. television journalist Savannah Guthrie.
Most of the gloves collected by investigators for examination turned out to have been dropped on the ground by searchers in the vicinity, the FBI said.
But the one with a DNA profile recovered from it is “different and appears to match the gloves” worn by the man in a ski mask seen trying to disable Guthrie’s door camera in the early morning hours shortly before she was abducted, according to the FBI statement.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos said on Friday that he was certain that the man in the video, who was also wearing a gun in a holster and an over-stuffed backpack, was the primary suspect investigators were looking for to solve the high-profile case.
Nancy Guthrie was last seen on January 31 when family dropped her off at her home near Tucson after she had dined with them, and relatives reported her missing the following day, authorities have said.
Nanos has said the elder Guthrie was extremely limited in her physical mobility and could not have left her home unassisted, leading investigators to conclude early on that she had been taken against her will.
At least two purported ransom notes have surfaced since she vanished, both of them delivered initially to news media outlets.
Traces of blood found on her front porch were confirmed by DNA tests to have come from Guthrie, officials said last week. Law enforcement and family members have described her as being in frail health and in need of daily medication to survive. She also had a pacemaker.
The sheriff said on Friday that DNA from people other than Guthrie or those known to have been in close contact with her had also been collected from her property, but there has been no official word on any further findings from those samples.
Savannah Guthrie, co-anchor of the popular NBC News morning show “Today,” has posted several video messages with her brother Camron Guthrie and sister Annie Guthrie pleading for their mother’s return and appealing for the public’s help in solving the case. In one video, they expressed a willingness to meet ransom demands.
Nanos told Reuters on Friday that no proof of life has surfaced since the abduction but he was quick to add: “There’s not been any proof of death either.”
The presumed kidnapping has drawn intense media attention as well as expressions of sympathy and support from President Donald Trump.
(Reporting by Herbert Villarraga in Tucson, Arizona; Writing and additional reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Alistair Bell)
